Market Share Trends for 2014 – Desktop Numbers Remain Healthy

With the passing of the old year into the new, I thought it might be timely to take a look at how the market share statistics finished up at the end of 2014. As usual, the preferred source for market share trends is NetMarketShare.

Desktop Operating System Trends – 2014

Points of interest:

How strong Windows 7’s market share is as at the end of December 2014 – almost 10% more than at the start of the year.

Windows XP, although dropping more than 10% during the year, still well and truly outnumbers Windows 8 and 8.1 combined.

Windows 8/8.1’s continuing dismal performance in the market place. Although, that’s no real surprise following the announcement of Windows 10’s impending release, plus the news that it will be a free upgrade.

Desktop Browser Trends – 2014

Points of interest:

Internet Explorer’s slow but steadily improved numbers throughout the year.

Ditto for Chrome

Firefox’s continuing slump, now below 12% market share with no sign of a reversal.

I decided to investigate a couple of additional areas this time round, with some interesting results:

Browsing by Device Trends – 2014

This one really surprised me. According to these figures, and despite all the doom and gloom to the contrary, desktop computers are still ruling the internet roost at the end of 2014. Sure, the percentage of connecting desktops has dropped slightly during the year but it still remains very healthy and well above the numbers for mobile devices.

Desktop Search Engine Trends – 2014

No surprise to see Google still dominating here but it’s interesting to note Bing’s steady improvement throughout the year, almost doubling its starting percentage. What saddens me is that none of the more private options, such as Duck Duck Go and Startpage, have impacted enough to even rate a mention, tucked away under the rather inglorious heading of “Others”.

About the Author

Jim is the resident freeware aficionado at DCT. A computer veteran with 30+ years experience who first started writing about computers and tech back in the days when freeware was actually free. His first computer was a TRS-80 in the 1980s, he progressed through the Commodore series of computers before moving to PCs in the 1990s. Now retired (aka an old geezer), Jim retains his passion for all things tech and still enjoys building and repairing computers for a select clientele... as well as writing for DCT, of course.

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